


Weekend Traditions

by delighted



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: (sloooowly), Getting Together, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-17
Updated: 2017-08-17
Packaged: 2018-12-16 13:37:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11829834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/delighted/pseuds/delighted
Summary: The boys are pretty big on traditions, like beer and take-out on Friday nights, or surfing Saturday mornings. So when they start sleeping together on Friday nights, it becomes a tradition. Until it becomes a whole lot more.





	Weekend Traditions

**Author's Note:**

> This one’s soft and slow and sweet.... Hopefully, it’s as comforting to read as it was to write.

The first time it happened, neither of them could have said for sure how or why it had started.

The Friday night take-out and movie thing had been one they’d fallen into at some point. Fridays after work when they didn’t go out with the team, they’d grab some food and head back to Steve’s, watch a movie or a ballgame, drink too much beer, and Danny would fall asleep on the sofa, or sometimes he’d go up to Mary’s room.  

But one Friday, Danny’d gone up the stairs after Steve, and instead of going to Mary’s room, he found himself walking into Steve’s room—Steve hadn’t even noticed, till he’d turned around and seen him standing just inside his doorway.

What had followed had felt like it was not entirely real. They both probably would have confessed that they’d not felt completely in control... it had just _happened_. Which is not at all to say that it hadn’t been good. Yes, they both were a little... out of practice, shall we say. And not to use that stupid bike metaphor, but some things you really just don’t forget. But they hadn’t minded taking their time—it had felt right somehow to go slow. There was no urgency, just quiet enjoyment. (Well, some parts weren’t all _that_ quiet, but you know what I mean.)

In the morning, there’d been no awkwardness, no forced excuses, no attempt to back away from what they’d done, but also no sweeping declarations. They’d stood across from each other in the kitchen, silently drinking coffee, then they’d gone surfing like they typically did on a Saturday morning, and after they’d each gone about their weekend activities, as usual.

The next Friday evening started out much the same way. Grabbing some food on the way to Steve’s, a movie on TV, a number of beers, and when Steve got up to go to bed, Danny’d only hesitated for one small moment before he’d followed.

Saturday morning went the same—coffee without comment, surfing, then their separate ways.

It continued like that for long enough without either of them questioning it, that it became expected tradition as much as getting take out or going surfing had been.

They didn’t think, honestly not for one moment, that it was a change that would be noticeable. (They didn’t feel it that way, so surely no one else would pick up on it.) And it wasn’t, at least not right away. But first Chin, then Kono, and at some point Lou and Jerry as well, began to notice (without voicing their observations to anyone else) slight alterations in the way the boys were with each other.

Steve often held the door for Danny (because he tended to get there first), but he seemed to hold it a little longer now, almost pause and breathe like he was collecting himself. And Danny always got a worried look when he was watching Steve attempt something stupid and reckless. But it seemed lately that look had a slightly new edge to it.

They were little things, subtle shifts. But most of the team had been used to watching the boys interact (though they’d all long since given up on either of them realizing what was obvious to everyone else _but_ Steve and Danny) and they slowly began to see that things were in fact changing.

Meanwhile, neither of the boys themselves would have claimed to have been aware of anything at all. They still had their usual weekend traditions, they’d just added sex to it. If anything, it was a practical addition, one that boosted their overall well-being. They were grown men, consenting adults, and arrangements like this were perfectly normal, not to mention healthy—perhaps especially given their respective awfulness at “relationships.” And again, completely practical, given their line of work. Really when it came to it, it just kind of made a whole lot of sense.

And, not to focus too much on the details or anything, but _man was the sex good_. They’d seemed to know instantly what they each liked, and though neither of them said it out loud (and maybe not even to themselves), it was the best sex either of them had ever had. If they did think about that in fleeting moments sometimes, they probably put it down to a lack of expectations. Or of any fears. They were solidly there for each other in all things, always had been. They’d just added a new peg to the board on that one, that’s all.

There wasn’t too much that could have changed outwardly in public anyway. Neither of them was really the hand holding type—they were more the bumping into each other playfully, wrapping arms around each other while they walked type. And _that_ was something they’d been doing for years.

As was sitting too close to each other at meals with the team, bringing each other food and drinks during cases, remembering preferences and favorites, ordering each other’s drinks at cocktail night.

Basically, most things couples did in public were things they had always done.

Which maybe explains why most people already thought they _were_ a couple. So it was those who “knew better” who were the only ones poised to pick up on the slight differences that began slowly to seep out.

Kono probably picked up on their posture because of her body awareness from surfing. It was really hard to discern, because they always sat close to each other, but she might have explained it as an increase in familiarity. She wanted to call it “intimacy” but couldn’t quite bring herself to go that far. But at some point she saw Steve whisper in Danny’s ear, and there was something about the way Danny held his body in response that seemed different. She looked away before she could study it further, because she felt that she was intruding—which actually might have been her biggest clue.

What Chin picked up on was certain gestures between them. Since Danny’d given Chin that lesson on reading Steve’s body language, he’d been paying more attention to both of theirs. It had taken Steve giving Chin a big hug after one grueling case for him to notice that the way Steve hugged Danny seemed a little... softer. After that he started noticing other little gestures between them, all of which he felt he was watching... well, _evolve_ seemed the best word.

Eventually Steve and Danny began to notice little differences themselves. For them it was things like it was growing difficult to not add a kiss to that hug. And the whisper in the ear now evoked memories of last Friday night and that amazing thing Steve did with his tongue. So maybe they were holding themselves a little bit differently, maybe their “thank god you didn’t die in that explosion” hugs had a little more tenderness, a little more desperation. The thing is, you have to understand that all along they’d been in love. It was just a slightly different expression of that love, but it was the same love, it always had been. So there was never going to be some huge dramatic shift, either outwardly or inwardly.

Which probably explains why it took as long as it did for them to begin to realize that there really _had_ been a shift, and maybe this whole weekend thing meant a lot more than they had been pretending.

The first time Steve felt it was on a Saturday morning when he just didn’t want to go surf.

Danny was still sleeping. Steve of course couldn’t prove it, but he was convinced that Danny slept better in his bed than in Danny’s own. Usually Danny awoke when Steve got up—he was a very light sleeper—and it occurred to Steve that morning that if he didn’t get out of bed, Danny might sleep longer. Feeling that Danny could use the extra sleep after the week they’d had, and finding he wanted nothing more than to watch the sunlight glint off of his partner’s blond hair, Steve stayed in bed, watching him sleep, till eventually he woke on his own.

Danny could tell right away that it was later than usual, but before he could comment, Steve leaned over and kissed him.

And that was the first time they had sex on a Saturday morning.

The boys are evidently pretty big on traditions, though, so it became another tradition, tucked neatly in with the others. And maybe they both began to realize they were straying outside the bounds of sheer practicality at this point and into something a bit deeper. But I think by then they’d begun to feel swept up in something larger than either of them could even comprehend. And really, their whole partnership had been like that from the beginning, so if neither of them felt it as anything other than what it _of course_ would be.... Well, they already had seven years of the rest of it pushing them along.

The next time there was a shift, it was Danny who allowed it. They’d surfed for longer than usual, and he was hungry. And he knew he didn’t have food at home, and he didn’t want to go shopping. So he suggested they go get some food. They wound up at this sweet hole in the wall café, and it was quiet—despite it being a Saturday, and there was a breeze out on the lanai, and since no one who knew them was there, when Steve brought the food over and leaned in close to Danny as he sat, Danny turned and kissed him.

And that might have been the moment that did it for Steve, in all honesty. Because it was their first “public” kiss (alright, there were like five other people in the restaurant and probably none of them had noticed, but still). And he felt something kind of huge shift in his chest.

“What was that for?”

Danny turned to his food, which looked delicious. “Dunno, just seemed about time.”

Steve could barely stop grinning enough to eat his food, and he made it harder on himself because he really needed to keep his arm around Danny after that kiss, and eating really big sandwiches with one hand is hard, even if you have hands like Steve’s. But it was worth it.

Possibly neither of them fully realized what they were doing when they added eating out to their Saturday tradition. But after a while, they both realized at least part of what they’d been practicing for, kissing in public, because eventually they “accidentally” did it in front of the team.

By that point, Kono, Chin, Lou, and Jerry had all become quietly convinced the boys had been up to something. So when they saw the boys kiss as they sat down one night at RumFire to celebrate a case, there was no big reaction like you might have expected. Instead, they each grinned knowingly—and then caught each other with exactly the same look.

Steve and Danny meanwhile, having realized what they’d just done, looked around awkwardly at their teammates, surprised by the lack of reaction.

And then they’d all had a lovely evening, and Chin bought an extra round of drinks, but no one made a big to-do or anything, and after that Steve and Danny found themselves “slipping up” and kissing in front of the team on a regular basis.

Up to that point, things had been on a strictly weekend basis. The first time that changed was on a Wednesday Danny was supposed to have had the kids. They’d both been sick and Rachel wanted to keep them at home so Danny didn’t get it as well. He wasn’t sure how Steve had known, but shortly after Danny’d gone home, Steve had shown up with the ingredients to make Danny’s grandma’s meatballs (which, come to think of it, Danny had no idea how Steve had known what to get), and they’d spent the evening drinking too much red wine, making too many meatballs, and that was the first time they had sex in the kitchen.

Wednesday night kitchen sex didn’t exactly become a tradition—they were both willing to admit they were getting a bit old for that kind of thing. But cooking together at Danny’s on nights the kids didn’t come over did. Then one time Steve came over when the kids _were_ there on a Wednesday night, and Danny would have thought it wasn’t a good idea, but it turned out it made the time with the kids even better—and not just because Steve did the dishes so Danny could read extra bedtime stories to Charlie, and not just because Steve was better at helping Grace with her science homework. At first Steve wouldn’t stay over on those nights, but Charlie kept asking why Steve wasn’t there in the morning, and Grace kept giving Danny these weird looks, and one night when Steve tried to leave before the kids were in bed, Charlie begged him to stay and Grace whispered (not very quietly) in Danny’s ear: “Stop being an idiot, Danno.”

And so that was the first night they slept together... without, you know, the other part.

Which actually might have been the biggest shift of all.

And there was something about it... something so peaceful, so magical, and maybe it was just that it gave them some time and some space to really feel what was going on, that this wasn’t simply “practical” or what made sense or... but there was actually a whole fucking lot more to it than, well, _fucking_. And maybe actually that was the first time they used the word “love” and knew they meant it, exactly the same as they always had, and that it was absolutely everything.

They cried that night. And there wasn’t any regret, no sense of “why have we not seen this” or “why did it take us so long.” Nothing like that. It was relief, and this really weird kind of sense of the time finally being right, or the scale being completely weighted towards it... _an inevitable slip of the slope_. And the fact that it was the kids who pushed that last bit was probably perfectly fitting.

When Grace walked into the kitchen the next morning, and Steve was making pancakes and smoothies, she kissed him on the cheek, said “I’m so glad you finally stayed,” and his heart was utterly lost.

That next weekend, he got Danny to bring the kids to his place, and he might have already started thinking about redoing Mary’s room for Grace, and his old room for Charlie, but he didn’t think he’d tell Danny. He thought he would like to do that all on his own.

Yep, he was utterly done for.

Monday night, after everyone else had left work, Steve stood in the door to Danny’s office, watching him finish up an email. When Danny was done, he looked up, and saw Steve watching him with a smile.

“Well,” Steve said, scratching the back of his neck. “What do we do now?”

Danny turned off his computer, and stood, grinning. He walked slowly towards Steve, kissed him lingeringly, and took a deep breath. “I have absolutely no idea, but I really don’t think we can go back to sleeping alone....” He trailed off, letting his hands run down Steve’s chest.

“Definitely not,” Steve replied, his voice sounding raspy to his own ears. He was pretty sure sex in the office would be a very, _very_ bad idea on a whole bunch of different levels, but they needed to get out of there fast, or there was a very real danger.

“So, we let it happen... kinda like we’ve been doing.” He kissed Steve again. “Better go to yours tonight, because I’m fairly sure we left a mess in the kitchen this morning, trying to get the kids out the door to school on time....”

“We haven’t had sex in my kitchen yet,” Steve felt the need to point out.

“No, we haven’t, have we....” Danny grinned, and grabbing Steve’s hand, led him out the door. “We’ll take the Camaro, we can get the truck in the morning.”

Steve squeezed Danny’s hand back. Huh, maybe they were the hand holding sort after all.... There were certainly several other things they’d never imagined they’d do, so adding holding hands to the list didn’t seem quite so strange now.

Neither did taking the time to thoroughly kiss in the parking lot.

Maybe it should have seemed strange that none of this had seemed strange. But it just didn’t. And as they stood there, next to the building that meant so much to both of them, under that crazy blue Hawaiian moonlit sky, with those Ent-like banyan trees waving at them, they might have felt a little like they were starting a new chapter, but it was absolutely the same book, and somehow that made it all the more exciting.


End file.
